Christmas Natural Lighting (or lack there of)

It's President's Day and I am still writing about Christmas, but when I look outside and see the snow fly and how beautiful it is, I can't help but turn on some of my favorite Christmas music and listen while I write.

Today's topic:  Natural Lighting and how we got rid of it.

We have been living in our worship space for 10 years now and our congregation has grown to a point that we need 6 worship services on Christmas Eve.  This is a blessing but it does pose a few challenges.  The greatest of which is service times and natural light.  I think it is safe to say that the majority of our congregation loves the candle light service atmosphere.  Whether it's the glow, the meaning, the warmth, the smell or the music sung while lighting the candles, people feel as though Christmas is not complete without it.

The problem: half of the services we offer happen before it gets dark, and we have lots of windows where light likes to come in.  Luckily we are in Minnesota and it gets dark early, otherwise we would have only one TRUE candlelight service.

We have 7 windows on each side of the sanctuary that provide great natural light...when you want it.

The solution: 1/2 inch Pink Panther FOAMULAR insulating sheathing.

We bought a few big sheets of the sheathing from Home Depot and had the store do the cutting for us.  Very handy.  The result:

Be sure to measure the windows before you do the cutting.

We are also lucky because we have easy roof access to the windows.  I climb up and shove the sheathing into the window on the outside.  The end result is a completely blacked out window with no pink panther staring at us.

Getting the sheathing out is also a tricky thing so we put a piece of duct tape on the bottom as a handle to pull it out when we were done.

Here are before and after pictures taken a year apart.

The effect was stunning and exactly what we had hoped for.


Some things to consider:

1.  The pink is visible from the outside when lit.  If you would like to avoid this problem it is simple to peel off the plastic coating and pain the sheathing any desired color.

2.  Make sure they fit well.  If they don't match correctly then light will leak in on the seems.  The sheathing is flexible to a point so it is best to measure slightly larger than needed.

3.  If you are slightly small and it is cold outside taping them to the window won't work.  I ended up using some tension rods I had laying around to make sure they didn't fly away.

4.  They will fly away.  If the wind catches them they will be long gone so make sure they are snug or secured.

5.  Make sure they are labeled.  I have done this once before and the first set grew legs and jumped into the dumpster.  Bow they are numbered, labeled as to what they are and a reminder to not throw them away.  This saves money in the long run.


Now I think we can put Christmas to rest.  The next blog posts will be focusing on what you can do with what you have: creating meaningful worship visuals on a weekly basis.

Have a great day,